Adolf A. Paier Jr., former top executive at Safeguard Scientifics, and Healthworks Alliance, and influential board member, has died at 83

Adolf A. Paier Jr., 83, formerly of Penn Valley, onetime president and chief operating officer at Safeguard Scientifics, former chairman and chief executive officer at Healthworks Alliance Inc., president of Novus Corp., influential board member, and philanthropist, died Wednesday, Oct. 5, of heart failure at the Beaumont at Bryn Mawr retirement community.

Adept at accounting, deal-making, and navigating the daily ebb and flow of financial markets and business acquisitions, Mr. Paier joined Safeguard Industries in 1967 and rose to become president and COO of Safeguard Scientifics, the company’s venture-capital vehicle, from 1980 to 1992.

He worked with company founder Warren V. Musser to refine Safeguard’s investment strategy in the 1970s, and revenues increased dramatically in the 1980s. Mr. Paier told the Daily News in 1986 that lessons from unwise acquisitions helped the company grow and that recovering from past mistakes challenged his imagination and financial creativity.

“Name the acquisition mistake, and we’ll give you the example,” Mr. Paier said. “We had to use 10 times the ingenuity to get out and survive than we used to make the acquisition in the first place.”

Mr. Paier left Safeguard as vice chairman and joined Healthworks Alliance Inc., a software developer for health-care providers, in 1992. “I wanted to get out of the rat race,” Mr. Paier, who spent 25 years at Safeguard, told The Inquirer in 2000. “I had enough of 60-hour weeks and heavy travel.” He served as chairman and CEO at Healthworks until it was sold in 2005.

He also became CEO of Novus Corp., a business accounting and financial consulting firm, and cofounded Privakey, which provides authentication and transaction verification to companies and their customers. “He always had an extremely sharp mind for numbers,” said Mr. Paier’s son Nate. “He also had very high standards for ethics and fairness, and those three things helped him excel in the business world.“

Mr. Paier served on corporate boards for DeltaPaper Corp., Analytical Graphics, and Probaris Technologies, and on other boards at the University of the Arts, the Lincoln Center for Family and Youth, and the University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.

A member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the Chief Executives Organization, and the Young Presidents Organization, he never really retired, his wife, Geraldine, said, and he recently had been chair of the finance committee at Beaumont at Bryn Mawr. He also financially supported the Penn Museum, the Desert Museum in Tucson, Ariz., and other organizations.

“It was important to him to give back,” his son said. In a tribute, his family said: “He engaged with people around him with integrity, honesty, intellect, and wisdom.”

Born Oct, 27, 1938, in Branford, Conn., Mr. Paier played football in high school and earned an associate’s degree from Quinnipiac College in Connecticut, now Quinnipiac University, in 1958. After being encouraged by a professor at Quinnipiac, he attended Penn’s Wharton School and received a bachelor’s degree in economics in 1960.

He served a stint in the Air Force Reserve, became a certified public accountant in 1963, and worked as an audit manager at the Touche Ross accounting firm in Philadelphia before joining Safeguard. He met Geraldine Shnakis on a blind date, and they married in 1966, and had sons Nate and Andrew, and daughter Alena. Alena died earlier.

Mr. Paier and his family enjoyed ski trips to Vermont and Colorado, summered in Avalon, and spent time at their other home in Tucson. He and his wife also traveled to France, Japan, China, South Africa, and elsewhere.

An avid runner and tennis player as a young man, he threw himself into golf and skeet shooting as he got older. He followed the Eagles, Phillies, 76ers, and Flyers, and served as the golf chairman at Philadelphia Country Club and the Ventana Canyon Golf & Racquet Club in Tucson.

He was a lifelong family man, and Mr. Paier looked after his mother and younger sister throughout his life. He provided his sister, Dorothy, with her first bicycle when she was young, bought her first car after high school, paid for her divorce, and answered the phone every time she called for advice or just to catch up.

“He was not my brother but my rock,” his sister said. “No matter what issues I had, Dolf took care of it for me. I was always so proud to tell everyone I was his sister.”

In addition to his wife, sons, and sister, Mr. Paier is survived by four grandchildren, a brother, and other relatives.

Services were Oct. 15.

Donations in his name may be made to the University of the Arts, c/o Andrew Pack, 320 S. Broad St., Philadelphia, Pa. 19102.